A wire wheel will not remove chrome/nickel/copper easily. scuffing up the chrome, like Ron said, might be your best bet, if you feel that paint will hold up on a hot exhaust system. I have been trying to get ahold of New Holland's exhaust paint, which they say is available through their dealerships, but unfortunately they are liars. They do sell the same color, but it's not the same as far as heat resistance and durability. The reason I started looking for New Holland's paint is because of a 1984 Ford 1210 tractor my dad owns. The paint is from 1984 on the muffler and is still intact. Incredible if you ask me. Unfortunately, that paint is not sold in their stores. Here's some things you might want to consider if the bike is not ridden in the rain too much. Chrome is extremely durable, so I would leave the finish on the pipes just for the sake of havin a good solid undercoat. Then, I would look into "Black Krome" plating from caswell. you won't need to do any sanding, you won't need to do a lot of clean-up if the part is brand new, never been on a bike, and basically, it's pretty hard to beat the durability. Drawback, the chrome plating must be stripped from the underlying nickel plating. "How?" you may ask... simple, stick the thing in some chrome stripper. It's relatively cheap, compared to other plating solutions. I think the smallest amount you can buy is 3 gallons, and that will only cost you about $40.
Furthermore, you can get a caswell plug and plate kit to do your pipe, so there is no need to have the whole pipe submerged in a tank. you simply plug in the plating wand, dip the cotton end into your plating solution, then wipe it onto the part to be plated. simple as it gets. cheaper too! $30 for a plug and plate kit, but you are deffinitely gonna need more solution than the kit provides, so tack on an extra $11 for every bottle of extra solution you need. I am not sure of the surface area size of the exhaust to be plated, but I'd imagine buying the $30 kit and 1 extra bottle of solution would get the job done. then, you have a dark smokey chrome pipe, with the durability of a hard nickel plated finish.
I am going to use a plug and plate chrome system to redo all the little bits and pieces that happen to need it, on my G3SS-B. Of course,with that bike, I can't plate too heavily, every pound counts when you have a 10 hp bike!
EDIT: I posted your quote from another post in my signature because everytime I see it, I LMAO. thanks!
Post edited by: john68, at: 2005/10/26 05:03